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Quotes from Speech in Cleveland, Ohio — Malcolm X

1925–1965 United States

← All quotes by Malcolm X

15 quotes

A segregated school system produces children who, when they graduate, graduate with crippled minds.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

How can you thank a man for giving you what's already yours? How then can you thank him for giving you only part of what's already yours?

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

I'm not going to sit at your table and watch you eat, with nothing on my plate, and call myself a diner. Sitting at the table doesn't make you a diner, unless you eat some of what's on that plate.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

A segregated school means a school that is controlled by people who have no real interest in it whatsoever.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

It takes heart to be a guerrilla warrior because you're on your own.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

It takes two to tango; when I go, you go.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

Human rights are something you were born with. Human rights are your God-given rights. Human rights are the rights that are recognized by all nations of this earth. And any time any one violates your human rights, you can take them to the world court.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

A ballot is like a bullet. You don't throw your ballots until you see a target, and if that target is not within your reach, keep your ballot in your pocket.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

It'll be liberty, or it will be death. The only difference about this kind of death—it'll be reciprocal.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

I don't see any American dream; I see an American nightmare.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

I'm not an American. I'm one of the 22 million black people who are the victims of Americanism. One of the 22 million black people who are the victims of democracy, nothing but disguised hypocrisy.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

I'm nonviolent with those who are nonviolent with me. But when you drop that violence on me, then you've made me go insane, and I'm not responsible for what I do.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

Black people are fed up with the dillydallying, pussyfooting, compromising approach that we've been using toward getting our freedom. We want freedom now, but we're not going to get it saying "We Shall Overcome". We've got to fight until we overcome.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

This government has failed the Negro. This so-called democracy has failed the Negro.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

In 1964, it's the ballot or the bullet.

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (1964)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Malcolm X (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.